Tag: FOI

Taoiseach’s diary 2001

As part of an ongoing process. The appointments diary of then Taoiseach Bertie Ahern for the year 2001. Redactions marked ‘A’ are so because the department believes them to be “personal information” as defined in Section 28 of the FOI act. Entries marked ‘B’ relate to the Taoiseach’s private papers as a member of the Oireachtas. Regards ‘B’ redactions – the cover letter from the FOI officer states “Section 46 of the Act states, inter alia, that the Act does not apply to records relating to any of the private papers of a member of the Oireachtas and as such I consider that the Act does not apply to these entries.”



Previously:
Taoiseach diary April 1998 to March 1999
Taoiseach diary April to December 1999
Taoiseach diary 2000
Taoiseach diary 2005
Taoiseach diary 2006
Taoiseach diary May 2008 to May 2009

Taoiseach’s diary 2000

As part of an ongoing process. The appointments diary of then Taoiseach Bertie Ahern for the year 2000.



Previously:
Taoiseach diary April 1998 to March 1999
Taoiseach diary April to December 1999
Taoiseach diary 2005
Taoiseach diary 2006
Taoiseach diary May 2008 to May 2009

CIE fuel consumption 2005 to 2009

A very long time ago I sent a request to Coras Iompar Eireann, the operator of Dublin Bus, Iarnrod Eireann and Bus Eireann seeking information on how much fuel they consumed, its cost, and the estimated carbon footprint. They have replied, finally, to my request.

In the five years from 2005 to 2009, CIE consumed 546,257,128 litres of diesel. This equates to approximately 1.747 billion kilos of carbon (at 3.2kg per litre), or 1,747 metric kilotonnes. The numbers are broken down as follows:

Dublin Bus consumed 168,940,369 litres from 2005 to 2009 (31% of total)
Iarnrod Eireann consumed 234,874,458 litres from 2005 to 2009 (43% of total)
Bus Eireann consumed 142,442,301 litres from 2005 to 2009 (26% of total)

The carbon dioxide emissions amount to over five times the mass of the Empire State Building.

CIE refused to give costs information on the basis of commercial sensitivity. The process of getting this information was an interesting one in itself and I will write more on this and give a further analysis of the data soon.

Phone numbers

A reader has commented that coincidentally perhaps, the phone numbers of Ivor Callely and his son Ronan are almost identical. According to his Facebook page, Ronan Callely’s number is 086 2571489. According to the Oireachtas documents, Ivor Callely’s number is 087 2571489 – a one digit difference which applies usually when your provider is different. Curious.

Callely phone claims – original documents

Luke Byrne of the Mail on Sunday, who penned the original story related to the mobile phone expense claims of Senator Ivor Callely on Sunday, has been kind enough to pass on the original documents received from his FOI request. I have run an OCR process on the documents, and combined them into one PDF.

A declaration on the claims form states:

I HEREBY CERTIFY THAT THE EXPENSES CLAIMED HAVE BEEN ACTUALLY AND NECESSARILY INCURRED BY ME IN RELATION TO MY MEMBERSHIP OF DAIL EIREANN AND THE PARTICULARS FURNISHED HEREIN ARE IN ALL RESPECTS TRUE.

This is signed and dated by Mr Callely on each claim form.

The company on the headed paper, which gives its company number at the bottom of the document (150878), put out a notice in February 1994 that a liquidator was being appointed. You can read the company’s submissions on the CRO website. The company was subsequently dissolved. The claim forms were stamped by the Oireachtas on November 21 and 22, 2007. Another document is the certificate showing that the company was wound up by the Examiner’s Office.

Here are the documents:


MoS investigation into Callely claims

In the past I’ve spoken about the odd – unfortunately, odd – position the Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday occupy in the national conversation… please Ireland, don’t sleep this time.

Luke Byrne knocks it out of the park. Cracking journalism.

A two-month investigation into the Fianna Fáil senator’s expenses claims show he was paid the cash on foot of invoices indicating he had bought four mobile phones in five years from a north Dublin firm. But the MoS has established that the company, Business Communications Ltd, went bust over a decade before Callely’s claim.

A former director told the MoS the invoices had not been generated by his company – and that Business Communications Ltd had never sold a mobile phone to Ivor Callely.

While Callely this weekend refused to comment on the damning revelations, they seem certain to spell the final chapter of his ignominious political career.

Can Callely come back from this one? More to the point, does anyone want him to?

All is not well in Galway City Council

Guest post: Enda Cunningham is a news journalist with the Connacht Tribune Newspaper Group in Galway, where he has worked on a freelance and full-time basis since 1997. He is also a regular contributor to several national newspapers and radio stations and while he is an ‘all-rounder’, he has particular interests in the areas of planning, property, business and finance. He can be contacted at ‘enda AT ctribune DOT ie’. We have previously covered his work on this site. – Mark

—

Environment Minister John Gormley might be wasting his time with the remit of his ‘planning review‘ in Galway County Council, when a probe into their counterparts in Galway City Council could throw up some real gems, as I discovered.

There’s a lot of info in this post, so please bear with me.

When it comes to paying Development Contribution Levies, some builders in Galway City have been a bit lazy, and it’s taking the Council up to three years to chase up some of the debts, such was the leeway being given.

In fact, the Council is currently owed around €5.4m in unpaid development levies, €1.3m of this is being chased up through the District Court and High Court, while the rest is the subject of enforcement orders or is being paid by installment.

The single biggest debt relates to the abandoned Crown Square development in Mervue – headed up by Padraic Rhatigan of JJ Rhatigan and Walter King of GK Developments – where almost €2.1m is owed.

I had a lengthy sift through a couple of dozen Galway City Council planning files which turned up some very interesting information on several of the biggest developers in Galway during the boom years, but the real golden nugget that emerged from my investigation that must surely be a real cause of embarrassment for officials – a typo on a planning condition which could cost the Council €468,389.29.

Basically, where the Council should have sought development levies for all 120 residential units in one particular development, they instead specified ‘apartments’ – of which there are only 28. Continue reading “All is not well in Galway City Council”